Slowboat to Hades
by asdfpenname
Summary: The story of how Gorillaz began, but with a twist - Damon and Jamie are the ones kidnapped by the band. To be continued!


_So, em…this is my first foray into the world of Gorillaz fanfic. Have patience with the slow start, this is just laying the groundwork for the insanity to come. I have the plot worked out but I'm open to change, so yeah, if there's anything you'd like to see happen, any ideas… I could work it in! Enjoy! __J_

_**The band claim that they discovered the trio [sic] sleeping rough in Leicester Square - NME, March 2001**_

Damon

Damon Albarn was not in the best of moods.

Being nominated for an array of shiny awards but not getting any of them was a sad fact of life when you were in a band; you dealt with it, you attended the after-party, schmoozed the big celebrities and got pissed blind out of your head. Blur had been doing it for years with flair.

But now, now…

He just couldn't do it any more. His heart had sunk when he saw the rueful grin on Graham's face, Alex's resigned little shrug straight after the ceremony. None of them were enjoying the night, enjoying each other, enjoying Blur. He was so sick of it, sick of everything, sick of the disappointments. He hadn't admitted it to himself before but he knew he was sick of the others too.

He _could _get smashed but not with them, get unbelievably drunk with no phlegmatic Graham to hold him back (when meanwhile Alex probably couldn't even spell 'moderation'), so drunk that maybe his abused liver would give out and hand him the ultimate ticket out of the music industry. It sounded good. Better than a party full of people snivelling, "_oh, what a shame you didn't make it, well there's always next year eh…_"

He snorted in anger at the thought and a figure came out of the shadows and resolved itself into a familiar face.

"…Jamie," he said after a moment's mental fumbling.

Jamie Hewlett grinned and acknowledged him. "Great night eh. Did Coxo fall asleep halfway through or was it just my eyes?"

Damon lit a cigarette and offered one to Jamie, who refused. "How did you get tickets?"

"I have my connections," said Jamie smugly. "Can't get into the party, though."

"It's full of knobs anyway. D'you want a drink?"

"Sure."

Damon learned he wasn't alone in his troubles - Jamie was nursing an ebbing career, a film flop and and other things he didn't exactly take in as they got drunker and drunker and anyway it was much more fun to wander lost around London and laugh at things. More fun than anything he'd done in a long long time.

Murdoc

Why Murdoc was wandering the streets at five in the morning wasn't anyone's bloody business, he didn't inquire into the lives of others so why should they rubberneck into his! Right? Right.

Years later when he was telling the wonderful story of Gorillaz he'd take care to highlight the fact he'd found them sleeping like hobos in the middle of Leicester Square in the pissing rain (it wasn't actually but whatever), but whenever he was asked what _he_ was doing there he'd quickly change the subject to the appalling amount of liquor they had had on board. It was destiny that he'd found them there. Murdoc Niccals, shining angel of Satan. Or whatever.

He saw the two sleeping figures from a distance but didn't pay much notice, not until he got closer and recognised one face as that bloke from Blur with the hair, looking properly washed-up curled up in a jacket and stinking of alco. You didn't get many celebs screwing up that badly, not these days, oh no they were all preened and pampered out of their pathetic little minds. Murdoc stopped and considered him, the other one he didn't recognise, but everyone knew Blur…

An idea, a half-formed bastard child of an idea was evolving in the bassist's brain. He scuttled back to a nearby flower display and crouched behind a flowerbox, took a stone in the palm of his calloused hand, aimed, threw it. The other one jumped and yelled and Murdoc hid, watching as the Blur bloke stirred sleepily. "Christ, Jamie…"

"Something hit me!" raged Jamie, sitting up, patting the back of his head, "Look! I'm fucking bleeding!"

The other picked up Murdoc's stone and blinked at it. "S'all bloody."

"Who threw that?" growled Jamie. "S'if my head's not bad enough?"

The other groaned and rubbed his eyes. "My back's killing me too…"

"What?" said Jamie distractedly.

Think I'll go back to the hotel… should have quietened down…"

Jamie patted the back of his head and stared at his hand. "How pissed were we? Sleeping in the street?"

Murdoc's leg was going numb so he shifted, scowling when a twig snapped.

"Very," groaned the Blur bloke. "Well, I enjoyed it… we should do this more often. Without the conking out on the street part."

"Yeah," grunted Jamie, looking annoyed, still patting his head. "Maybe. See you some other time."

The other hauled himself to his feet, they nodded at each other and separated. Murdoc immediately scuttled after the famous one. Famous was what he needed.

A perk of being two-dimensional was that you blended effortlessly with the shadows; Murdoc tailed him through the whole of West London, snitching an early-morning newspaper on the way. Damon Albarn, that was him. Career on the rocks, the newspaper gushed, Blur falling apart, last alum badly received, not one award last night - Murdoc could have cackled.

Eventually Albarn sloped into a hotel and Murdoc listened as he checked in. Once he had disappeared safely into the lift Murdoc strode forward, bold as brass.

"May I take a room, please?" he purred to the pretty receptionist. A bit skinny for his taste. Pretty, though.

She blinked a few times as people always did when confronted with a completely flat person and Murdoc took the opportunity to eyeball her book, still opened.

"Of - of course," she eventually replied, looking to her book. "How many?"

"One, love. With a double bed. Whatever takes your fancy." He winked, repeating Albarn's number and address over and over in his head.

She scowled. "_Excuse me?_"

Murdoc took one last glance at the book and fled, pulling out his mobile phone and dialling the house. "Um, 'ello?"

"Oh get off the fucking phone Faceache, get me Russel!"

"Wot? Russ's in bed, um, d'you wan' me to go an'-"

"Oh for the love of - you know there's a notepad next to the phone?"

"Well course I do Murdoc, it's righ' in fron' of me, I'm no' tha' stupid-"

"Shut up and take this down!"


End file.
